under the thumb
by basterd
Summary: kevin turvey/keith marshall stuff.
1. keith's place

[AN: so i wrote kevin/keith, how did that happen. i'll tell you. it's because kirby did. she started it. anyway, this is very boring and full of repitition.]

* * *

'It's a pretty big place you got 'ere, then.'

Kevin trails slowly after Keith, craning his neck to get a good look at the couch and the stereo and the window. There's not much else to look at in the room. It's pretty tiny, actually, like Kevin's bedroom but a bit bigger than his bedroom actually and this isn't a bedroom so it's not like he can properly compare. Smaller than Kevin's living room but then it's not his living room, is it, it's his mum's, but this is Keith's living room. It's all Keith's. 'It's like, really nice, isn't it.'

'Yeah!' Keith turns with a grin, glancing over the same three items of notice that Kevin had. 'I mean, it's not bad considering the severity of the fascist regime.'

'Mick hates it is well,' Kevin murmurs as he follows through into the thin hallway. 'He says he wouldn't even give Mrs Thatcher a shag if she wound up on his doorstep.' Keith points out the bathroom and Kevin grants enough designated interest with a widening of his eyes. 'I told him we don't have a doorstep. Just a mat that kind of tells you when to expect the door so's you don't run into it.'

'This is my bedroom. Got a bed, got a wardrobe, got a bucket there for if I'm feeling a bit crook sometimes, but I mostly turn it upside down to set my glass of water on.'

'Oh.'

Kevin fits his hand to Keith's elbow as he tries to look past him, peering around the small room. It's maybe the same size after all, but then Kevin's looks smaller 'cause it's got a desk and Keith doesn't have a desk. Probably because he's got nothing important to do, like investigating, he just plays his guitar all day and sings about stuff that Kevin helped him investigate. He wouldn't have a clue if it wasn't for Kevin, not really.

'You like it, then?' Keith asks, tilting his head sideways. Kevin nods.

'It's great, yeah, I'm not disputing that. Where am I gonna sleep, though? See, you've only got one bed. Don't know why you'd have more than one if it's just you. Or even if it wasn't just you, you'd still only have one bed 'cause the other bed would belong to the other person, wouldn't it.'

'We'll have to go head to foot.'

'But then I'll smell your feet.'

'Then we'll have to go foot to foot, won't we.'

Kevin shuffles around Keith so he can scrutinise the bed at a closer angle, trying to add some measurements to it. He'd spent a week studying a ruler against other things once, just so he could call on it later and measure in a hurry, 'cause you never know when you're gonna have to measure something really fast.

'But then our faces will be all close together so's we might accidentally kiss.'

Keith laughs, dragging Kevin in by the lapel and kissing his mouth shortly. Dragging's the appropriate word 'cause it really yanks at his collar but Keith's hand soothes it when it settles on the back of his neck. It's only there for a second because Keith's going back to the living room for another look. Maybe a proper one out the window, or he could have had some records stacked by the stereo. Kevin wasn't in investigating mode so he didn't concentrate too hard. Not like he concentrates on how warm his neck feels. It's a bit nice, this contact stuff.


	2. really homo

[AN: yeah. and then i did more. don't look at me.]

* * *

'Yeah, I love 'im. I just don't know why you want me to tell you, is all.'

Mick shrugs and continues to pick through the bowl of nuts, sticking all the cashews in his mouth.

'It's what you do, isn't it. You love someone and you tell them, so you can get married and have babies and whatnot.'

'But Keith doesn't want babies and anyway, he can't have 'em, and I can't either because I asked that nurse lady and she told me. She told me more than once so I'm really sure. It doesn't matter, though, 'cause I'm not gonna tell him.'

'Is it a secret?'

'Nuh, it's not a secret because I just told you and it's not a secret if you tell people.'

'Not if I keep it to myself. Then it's our secret.'

'But he knows already, so it's not a secret.'

Mick throws his latest nut down, shaking his head. 'But how can he know if you haven't told him? That's what telling is for, it's so they can know the thing that you know.'

Kevin sighs, folding his arms over his chest and tucking them in underneath his sleeves.

'It's 'cause I show him, Mick. I, like, touch his face and stuff, and his hair. Look, it doesn't really matter. It's not something you should be interested in because it's not fishing and it's not girls or fighting.'

Mick narrows his eyes, tapping his fingers against the bar top. A slow smile eventually spreads and he nods, pulling the nuts back toward him.

'You're under the thumb.'

'I'm _not._'

'You are, you both are. You under each other's thumbs.'

'How could we even do that, Mick. If I've got a bloody great thumb over me head, how can I be putting my thumb out over him. It just doesn't work, does it.'

'Hey.' Mick's chin jerks, and he waves his hand in greeting.

Keith is weaving his way around tables, hair mussed from the wind and tie askew. He touches Kevin's back when he reaches them and sits beside him. Sometimes he'll kiss the side of Kevin's head, but not if Mick's around. He doesn't want Mick thinking he's under the thumb.

'Keith,' Mick says around his chewing, leaning an elbow on the bar so he can see around Kevin. 'You know Kevin loves you, and it's not even a secret.'

Keith tips his head down, like he's fallen asleep against his chest like them birds you see on the telly sometimes.

'I s'pose I know, yeah.'

'Do you love him back?'

'It's not really any of your business.'

'Except that it is a bit, right, if you think about it. As Kevin's most dearest lodger, I've probably got a right to know.'

'Kevin, if you had another lodger, would your favourite still be Mick?'

Kevin glances across at Keith, and then over at Mick. He's never met another lodger, not even someone else's. He does like Mick, though. He's got nice records and he doesn't keep his books overdue when he borrows Kevin's library card. And Kevin's mum doesn't mind that he wears her nightie because she said he could and she says Mick is polite and Kevin wishes more people were polite.

'I guess he would be, yeah.'

Keith turns his head down the bar, looking for the tender.

'Yeah,' he says. 'Then I do love him.'


	3. christmas?

[AN: this went off-track fast.]

* * *

'Yeah,' Kevin says through the sweater. Keith's hands tug it down over his ears, and he handles Kevin's elbows for him until Kevin remembers to start working his limbs on his own. He pushes his hands through the cuffs while Keith holds them steady for him. 'And you'll write a song for me, won't you?'

'A really great song. The best.'

'Well I won't be able to know that until I investigate it. 'Cause your other songs, they weren't as— they weren't…'

Keith's expression wavers, like Kevin's mum's when she's on the telephone, or those people on the telly who are waiting to hear whether they got the answer right or whether the whole of Britain is gonna know that they's not actually as clever as they thought they were. Keith is clever. He knows loads about the sorts of questions they ask.

'Like, the songs on the radio, they're good, right, but they ain't got no passion or meaning, which is why I like yours.'

Keith's fingers are calloused from the guitar, rough and dry and they scratch but it feels good. No one's got hands like Keith's. He's got long fingers that always wrap underneath Kevin's ears when Keith cups his hands over Kevin's face, and he likes to do that even though he doesn't need to, because Kevin's usually looking at him already and his cheeks don't really get cold or nothing, not even in the chilliest whether, so Keith must just really like the feel of it.

He likes hugging, too. Not like Kevin's mum does, where it's brief and sort of routine, and not like Mick does when he's drunk and he forgets he's doing it and you have to remind him to let go. Keith likes tea-break hugs and park hugs and hugs from behind when he's tired and Kevin is reading. And he likes hooking Kevin in the crook of his elbow and keeping him close. Kevin knows because he investigated it, and he wrote it all down in a journal. So's he can be prepared.

But Keith's hands are on his face and they're warm and they smell like baking which smells like Christmas or maybe the tree in the corner smells like Christmas which kind of smells synthetic anyway and like, wrapping paper smells like Christmas a lot but it's just paper, isn't it, so does it really smell like Christmas or does it just smell like memory? Now the next time Keith goes to bake sometime through the year, Kevin will think of Christmas and how soft the sweater is before its first wash and how nice Keith's mouth is and how is hair is really clean and floppy and so Keith doesn't even mind if he messes it up because it'll just flop right back into place.

And when Keith eventually gets up and goes to check the oven, Kevin is going to think that he's pretty handsome, you know, for a bloke, and then he's going to feel silly and he's going to try and psych himself up and accidentally trip over the box of ornaments and crash into the tree and pull it down with him when he lands across the windowsill and cracks his head against the glass and Keith will carry him to the car while Kevin moans about his shoulder which turns out to be dislocated and the doctor says it's an easy fix and Keith says look over there at that dog which is stupid because they're inside and dogs aren't even allowed in here but then his shoulder will jerk and he'll faint. Only for a little bit.

Right now, though, he's got Keith's cotton-clad torso under his hands and he can feel his ribs a bit which is mostly because Keith is leaning so far forward so he can kiss all the way across Kevin's cheek and then over to the other side. And he's bought Kevin's mum a Christmas present and he's going to write Kevin a song and Kevin thinks he might actually be here next Christmas which is not something he's really thought about before but sits warmer than cocoa inside his stomach. Right now is nice.


End file.
